I parked my camper between two thorn trees on the Drove, just passed the crossing where the old A344 used to run, and spent the night there. In the morning there was a frost, despite the lateness of the season, with a thin mist rising in the hollows as the sun began to warm the landscape. It was May the 1st: Beltane. The Drove—full title “the Netheravon Cattle Drove”, also known as Byway 12—is an ancient right of way cutting across Salisbury Plain. Historically it was probably used to drive cattle from the village of Netheravon to Salisbury Cattle Market: … Continue reading Stonehenge Byway

I was at Stonehenge for the solstice morning sunrise again this year. You may know that I co-wrote a book a couple of years ago with the mad biker druid, King Arthur Pendragon, about the campaign to free Stonehenge for public access. Viewers may have seen Arthur on BBC2 on Saturday evening in a Culture Show special presented by Alistair Sooke. Arthur was the one wearing chain mail. He was also featured in an article by Will Self in the Guardian, in which he is described as follows: “It might be easy to dismiss Arthur Pendragon as an endearing eccentric … Continue reading Stonehenge at sunrise – still as exciting as ever

It was back in 1986, before the name change. He was still plain old Johnny Rothwell then, a crazy-arsed barbarian from the Farnborough and Aldershot area, head of a gang of outlaw bikers, a death-defying trouble-maker, a rebel and a fighter, known as “King John” at the time, not because he had any aspirations to royalty, but because he was famed for throwing full-moon parties at nearby Odiham Castle, also known as King John’s Castle. He’d had this weird revelation about his true identity – about his once, true and former name, as he describes it – in a run-down … Continue reading King Arthur Pendragon at Stonehenge

Mog Ur Kreb Dragonrider When I first started work on The Trials of Arthur, people thought that I was crazy. If I told people about Arthur they would say, “so where are you meeting him then, in a mental institution?” It became a hard thing to justify. I’d been moderately successful in my writing career up till then, with columns in the Guardian and the Big Issue amongst others. I’d had two books published. After I started work on what I’ve always referred to as “the Arthur book” my career went into terminal decline. I’m not saying that co-writing a book with a biker … Continue reading The Trials of Arthur Revised Edition is a Brand New Book